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conuly(It was every bit as ridiculous as I thought it would be.)
And that led me to this thread and the corresponding subthread where he really just gets into it with me, for no fucking reason, on the subject of "no mass produced book series marketed towards children would depict homosexuality in 1997-2007. No publisher would take it on".
This is a factually untrue statement, and I have the booklists to prove it. I'm not saying these books were necessarily available to every kid who might reasonably have wanted to read them, but to say they didn't exist at all? I bought some of them from Scholastic book forms! Bruce Coville? He's a big name! The Skull of Truth came out in 1997! Norma Klein? She's a big name! People absolutely heard of her who read realistic YA fiction. Francesca Lia Block? I never read her, but I had heard about her, I knew people who read her books, I knew her books touched on homosexuality. But here he is, arguing with me about it! Why are we arguing about something so absurd?
At least I figured out why this is bugging me, and if I get another reply I will tell him. When he claims that these books did not exist, that no mainstream publisher would have printed any of them, that no mainstream bookseller would have stocked them in the children's or teens sections, he's buying into the bullshit queerphobic narrative that before X date, everything was hunky-dory and those people either a. didn't exist or b. were happily closeted.
In the a version of this narrative, things were better then, and it is all this publicity that makes people think they're LGBTQ. In the b version, things are immeasurably better now and all those LGBTQ people should just stfu already and be grateful. And key to either version is erasing the proof that it's just not true*.
And part of that proof is juvenile fiction published by mainstream publishers in the dark days of the 20th century that involve LGBTQ themes.
FFS, it's like another flavor of "Women didn't write sci-fi until yesterday" and yes we did. Don't fucking devalue their very real difficulties in getting published and staying published by saying they didn't exist at all.
(And if you're about to tell me that I grew up in a socially progressive part of the country, I know! But according to his claims, so did he, with a liberal family and a bookseller uncle to boot. If he never heard of a single YA book with LGBTQ themes at that age, I imagine that must be because he didn't ask anybody or look very hard. I didn't ask anybody or look very hard either, and I still bumped into them just, like, on the shelves! Neither of us was growing up in a Fundiegelical hellhole, so.)
Note: I would've asked him if he'd ever heard of Heather Has Two Mommies, but that turns out to have been printed by an indie publisher after all. I never woulda thunkit after all the press it got!
* It is measurably better now in some aspects. The important thing is that the past does not just get uniformly more queerphobic the further back you go, and in a way that maps perfectly onto modern bigotry.
And that led me to this thread and the corresponding subthread where he really just gets into it with me, for no fucking reason, on the subject of "no mass produced book series marketed towards children would depict homosexuality in 1997-2007. No publisher would take it on".
This is a factually untrue statement, and I have the booklists to prove it. I'm not saying these books were necessarily available to every kid who might reasonably have wanted to read them, but to say they didn't exist at all? I bought some of them from Scholastic book forms! Bruce Coville? He's a big name! The Skull of Truth came out in 1997! Norma Klein? She's a big name! People absolutely heard of her who read realistic YA fiction. Francesca Lia Block? I never read her, but I had heard about her, I knew people who read her books, I knew her books touched on homosexuality. But here he is, arguing with me about it! Why are we arguing about something so absurd?
At least I figured out why this is bugging me, and if I get another reply I will tell him. When he claims that these books did not exist, that no mainstream publisher would have printed any of them, that no mainstream bookseller would have stocked them in the children's or teens sections, he's buying into the bullshit queerphobic narrative that before X date, everything was hunky-dory and those people either a. didn't exist or b. were happily closeted.
In the a version of this narrative, things were better then, and it is all this publicity that makes people think they're LGBTQ. In the b version, things are immeasurably better now and all those LGBTQ people should just stfu already and be grateful. And key to either version is erasing the proof that it's just not true*.
And part of that proof is juvenile fiction published by mainstream publishers in the dark days of the 20th century that involve LGBTQ themes.
FFS, it's like another flavor of "Women didn't write sci-fi until yesterday" and yes we did. Don't fucking devalue their very real difficulties in getting published and staying published by saying they didn't exist at all.
(And if you're about to tell me that I grew up in a socially progressive part of the country, I know! But according to his claims, so did he, with a liberal family and a bookseller uncle to boot. If he never heard of a single YA book with LGBTQ themes at that age, I imagine that must be because he didn't ask anybody or look very hard. I didn't ask anybody or look very hard either, and I still bumped into them just, like, on the shelves! Neither of us was growing up in a Fundiegelical hellhole, so.)
Note: I would've asked him if he'd ever heard of Heather Has Two Mommies, but that turns out to have been printed by an indie publisher after all. I never woulda thunkit after all the press it got!
* It is measurably better now in some aspects. The important thing is that the past does not just get uniformly more queerphobic the further back you go, and in a way that maps perfectly onto modern bigotry.
no subject
Date: 2025-04-19 09:37 pm (UTC)Mainstream shows tended to treat homosexual themes as subsidiary or supporting. ie. In the Golden Girls they had a gay cook, and a friend came to town and fell for Rose, but Rose wasn't gay, and they agreed to be friends.
I'm trying to remember if any mainstream shows had lead characters who were LGBTA. Northern Exposure didn't - supporting yes, main no, and they made off-color jokes about it. Friends? No - they made offensive jokes about it. Happy Days? No. Mary Tyler Moore? No. MASH? We had Klinger - but that was more his way of trying to get released, and he was making fun of transvestites (so no). ER? Not really or not that I recall. West Wing? I don't remember anything, but maybe? My So Called Life (yes, her best friend - I think), Facts of Life? (no), Family Ties (no), Arrested Development? ( I think so, yes, I think it did?), Mork and Mindy? (maybe?), Three's Company (no, it cracked jokes about it),
All in the Family (was admittedly a notch above, and more of a dramedy...like all of the Norman Lear series...).
It didn't really start changing for mainstream - until the commercials began to change, and that was more in the mid-00s, I think? I mean the network wouldn't let Willow and Tara share a bed or kiss until roughly 2002.
no subject
Date: 2025-04-19 11:17 pm (UTC)Then why (on a Watsonian level) did he keep up the crossdressing long past the point where it was clear it wouldn’t get him a Section 8?
no subject
Date: 2025-04-20 05:20 pm (UTC)I know this only because we had "After MASH" and he gave it up then.
"No, Corporal Klinger did not engage in drag in AfterMASH. Klinger's primary method of seeking a Section 8 discharge from the army during MASH involved cross-dressing. This was a strategy to try and get a mental health discharge, but it's important to note that he was not transgender or identifying as a woman. In AfterMASH, Klinger's character and storyline changed significantly. He was no longer in the army and pursued a different path. He did not return to the cross-dressing antics he used in MASH."
Also, if you've watched MASH recently? It's a lot of thing, but LGBTA friendly isn't among them. It's also extremely sexist.
no subject
Date: 2025-04-20 06:39 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-04-20 08:53 pm (UTC)